As Tony was finishing up his phone call with the loan officer, #2 came into the room. He's complained of a toothache for two days, and this morning he woke up with the entire left side of his face swollen. Not just a little swollen either. As in, I think his skin would break if it was stretched any tighter. His eye was swollen half shut, half of his lips were swollen, he looked like he'd been beaten, except he wasn't bruised. He assured me that his sinuses and throat were not affected and he could breathe fine. He even said his pain level was down from yesterday, but he was having trouble opening his mouth (to speak, and later when attempting to eat).
As always, the kids come first. We spent the rest of the morning calling the insurance company (despite numerous requests we still do not have dental cards, so we had to get the insurance numbers in order to make an appointment), then looking up and calling the dental offices on our list of approved providers, and waiting for a callback or two. We are incredibly fortunate that one of the dental providers was able to slip us in today. We've had a few dental emergencies in the past and have found it absolutely impossible to get in to see anyone within the same week or sometimes even the same month! Several times it was because nobody would accept our insurance (despite being listed as approved providers). A couple times it was due to scheduling issues, but this time we struck gold with getting in the same day for poor #2, and hopefully a dentist visit will cost less than an emergency room visit.
Anyway, he'll be on antibiotics for a week, and then we need to decide if we want to pull the tooth ($200, but someone once told me that pulled teeth need spacers or replacements to prevent other teeth where they're supposed to be - the dentist did not mention this though), or have a root canal ($2000, permanent fix, but a root canal effectively kills the tooth, and there have been a few researchers who suggest that keeping dead teeth in can lead to systemic and long-term health issues decades down the road). I feel this requires more research in the coming days to make an informed decision.
So, after all of that excitement it was already past 4pm, and I had thought up a couple more questions for the loan guy, so Tony left him a message and we awaited a reply (which didn't come, as it was the end of the day). I guess he told Tony this morning to talk to him before putting an offer in (not sure why Tony didn't say something then), so we couldn't put in a formal offer on the house. Instead, Tony sent an email to the real estate agent just after 5pm to inform her that we wanted to put in an offer on the house, but needed to speak to the loan officer one more time first. He even let her know that he's planning to contact the loan officer in the morning, and follow up by calling her to make it official. He gave her his work schedule for the next three days so they could further coordinate contact. She replied right away and said she'd get started on the paperwork and wait to hear back from us tomorrow!